Boz Metzdorf’s album Signs of Seasons, a cosmic folk ode to and from America’s heartland at the turn of another century, is given new space for its enduring charisma with a first ever digital reissue on Anthology Recordings.
Robert “Boz” Metzdorf — aka Biz Mitzwah, the art design sobriquet he used in the credits for Signs of Seasons— arrived at the tail end of World War II in Norfolk, Virginia to a naval officer father and a mother entranced by radio’s golden age of sound. After Boz’s family relocated to St. Paul, Minnesota in the early ‘60s, Metzdorf fell under the spell of radio mainstays like The Everly Brothers, Buddy Holly, and Gene Vincent, and soon after picked up his first six-string.
In 1964, Metzdorf formed The Missing Lynx, his first teenage garage band. After a line up unique to the period which included both a female lead guitarist and bassist, Steve Keys and Doug Rymerson eventually became full-fledged members in 1966. Metzdorf, Keys and Rymerson eventually completed the Minnesota-based, six piece, folk-country combo Freeland, known for their privately-issued Headin’ Back album on Moonchild Records from 1972. Following the dissolution of Freeland in 1976, Metzdorf began playing with some of his ex-bandmates in Bizzy Wiggins, a collaborative setting in which Signs of Seasons took form from a song catalog Metzdorf had been crafting 1967.
The self-financed sessions for Signs of Seasons commenced in winter of 1977 at Sullivan Sound Recording in St. Paul, running through spring of the following year. Co-produced by Metzdorf and Jim Maloney, who also arranged the string sections and played some piano and synthesizer on the album, the Signs of Seasons sessions included contributions from the majority of Freeland’s original lineup — Keys (bass/electric guitar/viola), Rymerson (electric guitar/slide guitar/harmonica), Tom Wiggins (piano/synthesizer/vocals), and, of course, Metzdorf (vocals/acoustic guitar)—as well as some local session players on various accompanying instrumentation.
While, retrospectively, you can trace a continuation of the going-up-the-country generation’s evolving aural tapestries and interests, the few fans of Freeland who were lucky enough to hear Signs of Seasons contemporaneously were in for a big surprise. The album carries a distinctly accomplished, high-budget and at times lush sound with varied instrumentation. It sounds unlike many other private-issue albums from the era. The players utilize their deep-seated, hive mind from the long hours, and years, of performing together to capture studio perfection in a positively baffling first or second take.
Spearheaded by Metzdorf, the combo broadens their prior collaboration into a palette of country, folk, jazz, and rock, capturing a ubiquitously breezy, mid-to-late-70s sound. That sound mirrored the vibrations being created further west with pinpoint accuracy, bringing to mind similar regional, eccentric anomalies like the Tumbleweed Records stable in Colorado, variety-stricken private press Americana mavens like Michigander Jeff Cowell, and the Californian-rooted and Hawaiian-based recordings of Merrell Fankhauser. All artists with one foot in the past, while resolutely dwelling in the present.
Metzdorf, a former poet and art major with a minor in journalism, peppers the song lyrics of Signs of Seasons with searching, near mystical poeticism, and a wonder of nature strengthened by a fondness for Robert Frost’s environmental poems. The album traces Metzdorf’s personal journey and mind’s eye ruminations on youthful infatuation (“Childhood Sweetheart” set to lap steel-accented country-rock), the pure, untainted love for a child set to baroque and classical guitar figures in “Music Box,” and the eternal nourishing force of nature in the love letter to the Earth Mother in the title track (resplendent with swelling strings).
Metzdorf retreats from the ruined world to off-the-grid country simplicity (“Down On The Farm”), and the depression and despondency that forced him from civilization after a disappointing band split and his hopeful return( the late psych / AOR glide of “Sails Across The Sea” and the Pacific Highway soft rock of “Calling You Home,” respectively). Metzdorf concludes Signs of Seasons with “Making Waves,” a witty, jovial ’n’ jazzy anti-establishment ditty carrying some of his mother’s musical influence via Dan Hicks and His Hot Licks, or early Loudon Wainwright III.
Originally issued in the summer of 1978 on the fly-by-night Centurion Records (seemingly, another tale in the tax scam records saga), the scarce collection of richly melodic, rural singer-songwriter Americana tunes which comprise Signs of Seasons can finally be accessed to dance in the imagination of all “city settlers and country slickers.”
credits
released October 29, 2021
All songs written and arranged by Boz Metzdorf
Strings written and arranged by Jim Maloney
Produced by Jim Maloney and Boz Metzdorf
Recorded and engineered by Mike Sullivan at Sullivan Sound Recording (St. Paul, MN)
Mixed by Jim Maloney, Mike Sullivan and Boz Metzdorf
Assistant mixing engineering by Peter Martinson
Transferred and remastered by Al Carlson
Cover art and design by Biz Mitzwah
Boz Metzdorf – Vocals, guitar
John Fort – Congas on “Over the Years”
Denny Hemingson – Pedal steel on “Childhood Sweetheart” and “Wide Open Spaces,” dobro on “Ride With the Devil”
Steve Strong Keys – Bass, electric guitar on “Childhood Sweetheart,” “Sails Across the Sea” and “Running in the Rain,” harmonica on “Wide Open Spaces,” vollo on “Running in the Rain”
Linda Lee – Flute on “Calling You Home”
Jim Maloney – Synthesizer on “Signs of Seasons,” “Sails Across the Sea” and “Over the Years,” piano on “Over the Years”
Thom Miller – Violins on “Signs of Seasons” and “Over the Years”
Dan Perry – Vocals on “Calling You Home,” “Signs of Seasons,” “Childhood Sweetheart,” “Music Box,” “Sails Across the Sea,” “Running in the Rain,” acoustic guitar on “Signs of Seasons” and “Music Box”
Jim Price – Violins on “Signs of Seasons” and “Over the Years”
Ron Rotter – Drums, wind chimes on “Calling You Home,” percussion on “Sails Across the Sea”
Dough Rymerson – Electric guitar on “Calling You Home,” “Making Waves” and “Running in the Rain,”
slide guitar and harmonica on “Down on the Farm”
Gary Schulte – Violins on “Signs of Seasons” and “Over the Years”
Bob Vanelli – Saxophone on “Making Waves” and “Over the Years,” flute on “Over the Years,” vibro slap on “Sails Across the Sea”
Ron Wiggins – Fender rhodes on “Over the Years,” vocals on “Ride With the Devil”
Tom Wiggins – Piano on “Calling You Home,” “Making Waves,” “Down on the Farm” and “Sails Across the Sea,” vocals on “Calling You Home,” “Signs of Seasons,” “Childhood Sweetheart,” “Making Waves,” “Over the Years,” “Wide Open Spaces,” “Down on the Farm,” “Sails Across the Sea,” “Running in the Rain” and “Ride With the Devil,” synthesizer on “Running in the Rain”
Originally released in 1979 on Centurion Records
All songs published by Silver Quill Music (BMI), 1978
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